


Puzzle Pieces

by Badwolf36



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Episode: s03e18 Riddled, Gen, Stilinski Family Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-17
Updated: 2014-02-17
Packaged: 2018-01-12 19:32:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1196814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Badwolf36/pseuds/Badwolf36
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They used to do puzzles together as a family. But he doesn’t want to solve this puzzle. Not alone. Not at all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Puzzle Pieces

**Title:** Puzzle Pieces

 **Fandom:** Teen Wolf

 **Rating:** PG

 **Characters:** Sheriff Stilinski, Scott McCall, Isaac Lahey, Claudia Stilinski, Stiles Stilinski

 **Word count:** 1,100

 **Disclaimer:** I do not own Teen Wolf or any related properties.

 **W** **arnings:** Set in "Riddled."

 **Summary:** They used to do puzzles together as a family. But he doesn’t want to solve this puzzle. Not alone. Not at all.

 

He’s always liked puzzles. 

Claudia used to laugh at him for that. She’d ask him, “Don’t you get enough of puzzle-solving at your job?”

But it was one of the few activities they could do together as a family that Stiles could actually sit still for, even with his ADHD, and that was a miracle worth appreciating. Granted, Stiles would usually hide the last puzzle piece under the dining room rug, then magically “find” it once the puzzle was almost done so he could have the honor of putting it in place. Claudia would laugh and he’d smile and Stiles would giggle like he was sure his deception had gone unnoticed. They’d spend hours together that way, putting together images of flowers, landscapes and wildlife. 

But he doesn’t want to solve this puzzle. Not alone. Not at all. 

He tears up the list of symptoms every time he writes it, hoping that it’s not what he thinks it is. Because it can’t be _that_. The world can’t be so cruel as to make that Claudia’s legacy for their son. 

In a weird, sick sort of way, he wants his son’s connection to that messed-up tree he’d almost been killed under, that Stiles had died as a sacrifice for, to be the cause of his nightmares and confusion. If it’s the Nemeton, then maybe some crazy mojo from the town vet/druid guy or his son’s werewolf friends can break it and he can get _his_ Stiles back: the laughing, lively prankster who nags him about his diet and who can sleep through the night and the morning without more than a few off-key snores.  

But he has a feeling that’s not it, a feeling that comes from years of honing his deductive skills and from endless days spent clutching Claudia’s hand as she reclined in her hospital bed and grew more and more agitated when he couldn’t see the fireflies that she so clearly could. 

He has all the pieces, but he doesn’t want to solve the puzzle when he knows what it will look like. He can see the picture on the box already and it’s of a gray and dreary landscape he knows all too well. It features his wife’s tombstone in the foreground, an empty flower vase in front of it, and a granite slab a few rows back marking out where his son lies in the local graveyard. 

He knows there’s no cure for frontotemporal dementia. He checks every year on the anniversary of Claudia’s death, so he knows that fact all too well. He knows Stiles does too, because Stiles does the same thing on her birthday. 

But even when he doesn’t want to acknowledge the truth (werewolves, banshees, druids, a Darach, his son’s deteriorating condition, a dying girl who knew about his wife’s death before he did), his job makes sure that he has no choice but to take in every piece of information as a puzzle piece. 

And Stiles is giving him too many puzzle pieces for that awful truth, that terrible puzzle he doesn’t want to solve. 

He pulls out his notebook yet again, flips back the leather cover and picks up a pen from his desk. 

He writes down the pieces one by one:

\- Impulsive

\- Hallucinations

\- Insomnia

\- Night Terrors

\- Dissociative

\- Confusion

He takes a deep breath. Then he takes another. 

It takes a great amount of effort not to tear the sheet of paper out of his notebook, shred those damning puzzle pieces into bits and throw them away, where he won’t have to see them staring him in the face. He’s done it before, after all. 

But his son is smart and he likes puzzles, too. The walls of his bedroom (plastered with crime reports, suspect and location photos, and far too much red yarn alongside old band posters) are proof enough of that. 

So he leaves the page where it is. He closes his notebook and tucks it back into his uniform pocket. 

He takes another deep breath and stands up. 

If he has the puzzle pieces, then so does Stiles. And he refuses to let his son, his and Claudia’s clever boy, see that complete picture on his own. He’s going to be there for him, stay by his side when that final piece slots into place and lets them both know whether the past is repeating or not. 

He moves out into the bullpen and surveys his nightshift officers. They’re all good, loyal people, even the new ones like Deputy Parrish, and they have no idea of the danger they’re in from the supernatural world. He looks up and sees the samurai their sketch artist created from Special Agent Rafael McCall’s description of the thing that attacked him at Melissa’s house. 

‘Just because you don’t believe in something doesn’t mean it can’t hurt you,’ he thinks. It’s with that thought in mind that he makes the decision to talk to Stiles when he gets home, tell him that he thinks Stiles should have an MRI, just to be sure of what they’re dealing with. He almost pulls out his phone to call Melissa McCall and have her make the appointment right then, but he decides to wait until he can talk to Stiles. 

And then he glances over and sees Scott McCall and Isaac Lahey hovering at the bullpen’s entrance, their panicked gazes locked on him. He also sees that Stiles isn’t with them. He glimpses the time on the wall clock. They should be in bed. They should all be in bed. But if those two are here, and Stiles isn’t…

“Tell me what happened to Stiles,” he says, voice shaking. His officers look up at that, but he can’t concentrate on them, instead watching as the two boys rush over to him. 

He thinks of the list in his pocket, those puzzle pieces he never wants to see put into place. He thinks of the way Stiles had struggled in his arms after another nightmare, screaming as he was tortured by things he couldn’t protect him from. He thinks of the way his son had stared at the instructions on a package of steamed vegetables, fingers running over the letters like they didn’t make sense. He thinks of the way he’d caught Stiles two nights ago, hand stalled on the doorknob at 2 in the morning, sleepwalking like he did when he was a kid. 

He turns fully to Scott, squaring his shoulders as he waits for another puzzle piece to fall into place. 

“Tell me where my son is.”

 


End file.
